Remember
by Olivia Dunham
Summary: In two months, Daniel Faraday would have been in the place for a year. A whole, single year. 365 days. 52 weeks. 12 months. However you wanted to say it, it was still the same amount of time. And he didn’t like it. Dan/Charlotte oneshot


_A/N: This was an old oneshot I had written before, then my computer crashed and I lost it. So I rewrote it, and in my opinion, it came out better! Enjoy!_

XXX

In two months, Daniel Faraday would have been in the place for a year.

A whole, single year. 365 days. 52 weeks. 12 months. However you wanted to say it, it was still the same amount of time.

And he didn't like it.

He felt as though he had wasted away. Actually, he had. His mind was completely gone. Complex formulas to the simplest of names, he couldn't even remember. And he hated that he couldn't remember. Every day he would sit in his tiny room, lie on the bed and stare at the ceiling, and try, so hard to remember. But nothing would ever come to him. Brief flashes of an ocean, forest, and that's it.

Every day at eleven, the nurse comes in and brings him medication. Some days he takes it, some days they have to stand there and force him to take it. Daniel doesn't think he needs it – he doesn't even belong in this mental institution. He just has a memory problem, it's not like he's crazy or dangerous.

Except when he gets too frustrated – then he usually ends up hurting himself and they have to sedate him. Then he goes to sleep, and it makes his memory even worse. He can't stand it when they sedate him, so he tries hard to keep calm and not get frustrated. Sometimes, it just happens.

But every other day, he gets a visitor.

She's pretty, he thinks, with red hair that's grown past her shoulders, and pale blue eyes that shine almost when she sees him. She always seems happy to see him, and always spends the entire day with him, not leaving until one of the guards come in to tell her visiting hours are over.

She's there now, as Daniel lies on his bed on his side, facing her. Every time she comes, she tells him her name – he can't remember it ever – and then tells him a story. He likes her stories. They're of far away islands with weird creatures made of smoke, and polar bears that don't belong. Of an anthropologist and a physicist who came to the island to rescue the people that had been stuck, with a Ghostbuster who was always funny and a drunk pilot who kinda ignored them. And the anthropologist and the physicist fell in love, and lived happily ever after even when they got off the island.

Sometimes, she would tell him special stories about how the anthropologist and the physicist met. She would tell of children on the Island before it became a weird island, and how the two used to play together and go to school together. Then the anthropologist got taken off the Island because they didn't need her parents anymore, and the physicist left too, only later.

Then, she would leave.

He didn't like it when she left.

But today, she seemed different. There was no shine to her eye, and she looked sad, almost as if she were crying. She didn't tell him a story, just sat there and looked at him. He looked back, but not at her eyes – he was playing connect the dots with her freckles, every once in a while running a hand through his hair, which was already sticking in several different directions.

"Daniel." She says suddenly, very hoarsely. For a moment he tries to think of who Daniel is, until he realizes it's him. "Don't you remember?" Her voice is soft, almost shaky as she speaks. She doesn't look at him, but chooses to stare at where she's wringing the edge of her shirt.

"Um….." He says blankly, unsure of what exactly he's supposed to remember. Nothing's coming to him. "No. S-Sorry."

She looks a him, and she's crying, the tears rolling down her cheeks and playing connect the dots with her freckles, moving over the lines he had traced out in his mind when he had been thinking about it. He wonders why she's crying.

"The stories. Don't you understand? Y-you're the physicist and I'm the anthropologist! We went to that island together, and we came back!" She insisted fiercely. "And still, you don't remember do you?"

Slowly, he shakes his head.

She leaves, and he doesn't see her again for a while. At the end of the week, the doors opens and he expects to see her, but it's only the nurse with his medication and an envelope. He thinks he sees a glimpse of red in the hallway, but in the next moment, it's gone.

"These came for you, Daniel." The nurse says sweetly as he takes his medication and she opens the envelope for him, handing him what's inside. It's several pictures, and he doesn't know when they were taken or whom they're off, but yet he looks at them.

In the first one, he sees himself, and the redhead. She's laughing, sitting on a tire-swing and clinging to the rope, with himself standing behind her, as though he's pushing her. He's surprised to see that he is too smiling.

The next one brings a faint flicker to his mind. Five people standing in a row, two of them holding children – a little blonde boy and a small baby who looks barely a month old. They are smiling, looking happy into the camera. He wonders why they're so happy.

Another flicker of a broken memory, this one of a boat. A big boat. And a helicopter. And…. the pilot? From the story? A storm – lightning flashing as the ground suddenly disappears below him.

There isn't anymore pictures, but a video tape. The nurse, who has been standing there the entire time, takes it and puts it in the VCR below the tiny TV in the corner. This time she leaves, and he faintly hears her promise to be right back.

He instantly knows the tape is a home video.

_The camera is shaking slightly as the inside of a house is shown, peering around a corner to show the redhead sitting at a table, cards in her hand, an intent look on her face. She's not the only one at the table, but a woman he's never seen before is with her, also holding cards. And one of the guys from the second picture is there, also looking very serious as they play a game of poker. The redhead looks over at the camera and laughs._

"_Put that thing away Dan – come play cards."_

"_Y-You know I can't, um, bluff or whatever it's called." He hears his voice from behind the camera. A little blonde haired child runs by and a woman's voice is heard, calling after the young boy._

He remembers a baby, on the boat he had been driving back to the bigger boat.

_Another date appears in white lettering along the bottom of the screen, and its focused on him this time, wearing a blue shirt with a black tie. Something red is stained all over it, but he's smiling. He doesn't know who's holding the camera this time, as it shows the woman next, who's bent down on her knees, laughing as she tries to fix a hair-band in a child's flaming red curls that match her own. The little girl is dressed in a pretty blue dress with an apron, clutching a white stuffed rabbit. The woman herself is wearing a bright red dress that sparkles when she moves, with a pair of white bunny ears attached to the headband on her own head. _

"_Hey! I told you I don't want filmed in this!" The woman says seriously as she gets to her feet, having fixed what is obviously her daughter's headband. A female laugh can be heard behind the camera as it turns and the blonde who is actually filming comes into view._

"_This could be used as excellent blackmail later!"_

"_Mary!"_

"_Yes, Charlotte, my favorite sister?"_

Charlotte.

The name echoes in his mind. Almost as if a chain reaction, he suddenly remembers, nearly tripping over the blankets as he struggles to get to his feet, calling out her name as everything comes back to him in one mad rush.

"Charlotte! _CHARLOTTE_!" He's hitting the door now, trying to get the nurse's attention outside so he can get the nurse to bring him Charlotte. He has to talk to her, now. But the nurses come in, as well as the doctors, and the next thing he knows, everything's blacking out and he can't help but go to sleep.

When he wakes up, he's surprised he can remember. Charlotte. Charlotte. _Charlotte. Charlotte_. He repeats the name in his head, as he remembers other things. Suddenly everything in Charlotte's stories makes sense, and he can remember that she is in fact the anthropologist, and he is in fact the physicist. And he misses her. The name Elizabeth passes through his mind, with the name Eloise and a cute white rat that had died. And the six people that they rescued from the strange island.

As he sits up and blinked. There was a blur of red, and a pair of arms wrapped themselves around his next. His shirt was wet within a few moments, from where Charlotte was crying against his shoulder. She pulled back to look at him, wiping her face with the sleeve of her shirt.

"You remembered." She whispered.

This time, he nodded, and actually smiled. She let out a watery laugh, and hugged him again. Another set of arms locked around his legs, and he blinked a few moments, looking down. A little girl looked up at him with wide brown eyes, giggling slightly.

"Hi daddy."

"Elizabeth." He said, testing the name out. She nodded and crawled up onto the bed with him, wedging herself between him and Charlotte.

He was glad he remembered.

Now he could finally go _home_.

XXX

_A/N: Another oneshot! Woo!_


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